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Comprehensive Abstinence: A Complete Sexual Education

Many people believe the phrase, "Kids are going to have sex anyway" is an assumption, however, data from the most recent Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) indicates that half of all high school students have engaged in sexual intercourse. These numbers rising thirty-nine percent per grade level (Terry). This rising rate of sexual promiscuity is in direct correlation to the number of unplanned teen pregnancies, sexually transmitted disease infections, and the contraction of the HIV/AIDS virus in adolescents in the United States. The reality of the situation is that the majority of young teens in the United States will engage in sexual behavior prior to high school graduation. This is why our public school systems in the United States should teach students comprehensive abstinence, as opposed to simply abstinence.
The detrimental outcomes of young teen's participation in sexual activities have spurred public schools and the federal government to formulate school-based sexual education programs. In a study performed by Steven P. Ridini of two separate Texas towns, one woman commented that "Schools should not teach our children anything unless they can teach them total abstinence. Anything other than that would not be healthy for our children" (Ridini, p.114). Unfortunately, George W. Bush agrees with this woman from Ridini's study, and has offered grants in excess of $85 million dollars in order to teach abstinence in the public school system. Although the federal government is currently funding Abstinence-Only programs for school-based sexual education, a more comprehensive message should be instated. Comprehensive abstinence programs would better prepare and educate adolescent students of not only the risks involved with sexual activity, but also to the STD and pregnancy prevention methods such as contraceptive use, while supporting abstinence as the most effective and healthiest choice. In other words, abstinence-only programs fail to inform students of...